Wednesday, February 8, 2012
News Florida Title Insurance Giant Is Buying O'Charley's
Posted by Nicki Wood on Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 11:06 AM
Nashville-based O'Charley's (CHUX, as it trades on the stock exchange) operates 227 restaurants under the O'Charley's name, 105 under the Ninety Nine concept, and 10 as Stoney River Legendary Steaks.
The Florida company will fold O'Charley's into a restaurant holding company it controls: American Blue Ribbon Holdings. Fidelity National owns almost half of that Denver-based venture, which runs a number of concepts and has annual revenues of $460 million.
O'Charley's, though not nearly as large as another locally based restaurant chain, Cracker Barrel, is something of a Nashville institution. Longtime residents will remember the first O'Charley's opened on 21st Avenue as a date-night spot in the 1970s. Watkins sold the restaurant in 1980 to entrepreneur Dave Wachtel in the 1980s, Watkins went on the found Cheeseburger Charley's with his son, Chuck, in 1988.
Fidelity National paid a 42 percent premium over the chain's closing share price last Friday of $6.92, which is a serious chunk of lettuce. Good move? Bad move? No big deal either way?
Wine Wine Wednesday: What Would You Say to ... Wine from Dave Matthews?
Posted by Chris Chamberlain on Wed, Feb 8, 2012 at 8:15 AM
OK, it's not as simple as that, but then again neither is making wine. Fortunately Matthews has allied himself with Steve Reeder, a legendary Sonoma Valley winemaker and the mastermind behind Simi Winery. With experience at Kendall Jackson and Chateau St. Jean, Reeder is known for making some truly exceptional wines.
Together Reeder and Matthews have formed Dreaming Tree Wines where they produce a Caberbnet Sauvignon, a Chardonnay and a red blend that they call Crush. Affordably priced in the $15-$20 a bottle range, all three varieties are pleasant table wines that exhibit a depth of character unexpected from a new "celebrity wine." Plus, a portion of all sales goes to support the efforts of the Century Council against drunken driving and underage drinking, but you can feel good, if not a bit hypocritical, while you're drinking.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Events Turnip Truck Market in the Gulch Launches Free Classes
Posted by Dana Kopp Franklin on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 3:32 PM
- theturniptruck.com
Thomas "will dispel myths about certain supplements, make suggestions about ways to use them, offer suggestions for home remedies, and discuss steps to a healthy heart," according to the store's announcement. The class is scheduled for 6 p.m. this Thursday, Feb. 9, and 10 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 11.
Classes are free, but you need to register in advance, and seats are limited. For registration and info, contact Kathryn Johnson at kathryn@theturniptruck.com. Class participants will receive a 10 percent discount on groceries purchased at the time of the class, plus a $5 gift card toward grocery purchases during a return visit. The offers are valid only in the Gulch store, not at the original Turnip Truck in East Nashville.
Classes will continue on the second Thursday (6 p.m.) and Saturday (10 a.m.) of each month.
The next class, set for 6 p.m. Thursday, March 8, and 10 a.m. Saturday, March 10, "will concentrate on health food buzz words, including understanding the differences between organic, natural, and sustainable, as well as GMO stands for and why it’s important," The store says. "Future classes will focus on responsible meat and seafood sourcing, celiac disease and gluten-free foods, using local and seasonal produce with variety, beer tasting and pairing, and cooking with bulk items like trail mix and dried beans."
Turnip Truck Urban Fare is located at 321 12th Ave. S. in the Gulch, (615) 248-2000.
Good advice Buy a Share of Your Own Personal Chef with FEAST Together
Posted by Chris Chamberlain on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 8:41 AM
Benjamin Surmi and Jenny Vaughn Harrison are the co-directors of FEAST Together, an organization founded to empower the community by creating community kitchens to provide healthy and sustainable foods. Their model is a little bit complicated, but basically they have established two kitchen spaces where local chefs can work to create meals for distribution to subscribers.
And they've already enlisted three pretty prominent cooks to lure subscribers for the upcoming winter term: Martha Stamps, Matt Bolus and Casey Dailey.
Think of the concept as a kitchen version of a CSA. Subscribers pay a fee to sign up for a particular chef for a quarter and then can buy prepared meals at discounted rates for pickup or delivery once a week. If you don't want to sign up to support a particular chef, you can also buy from any of the chef's menus to plan your own weekly dining, albeit without the cheaper rate.
No matter which way you do it, the chefs commit to use local seasonal ingredients whenever possible, so you can be sure that you're purchasing the freshest food available. FEAST Together is still looking for new kitchen spaces to expand the program, but the roster of chefs they've already signed up is impressive.
The first to toss her toque into the ring was Chef Stamps, a longtime local favorite and an early advocate for local and organic food. The structure of her meal plan involves a membership fee based on the length of the term and the number of diners participating. Basically, it works out to about $7.50 per meal per person for chef-prepared, healthy food and admission to a regular Wednesday night supper that Martha hosts at West End United Methodist Church, which is the same night and location of her weekly meal pick-ups. All her dishes are packaged in either glass jars, BPA-free reusable plastic or recyclable aluminum tins.
TV Dinner Aspiring Food Entrepreneurs, Bobby Flay Wants You for New TV Series
Posted by Nicki Wood on Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 5:55 AM
- Bobby Flay on Facebook
- Do you wish Bobby Flay was around to tell you what to do?
The Bobby Flay Project is looking for food entrepreneurs who have left their previous career to start a bricks-and-mortar food business. (And I assume that "left their career " means "lost their career in the recession.")
The plan seems to be to follow the entrepreneur as he or she opens the business, so the business can't be operating yet.
Three key points of eligibility:
* The entrepreneur must have little or no prior professional culinary experience.
* The entrepreneur mus be planning to open a brick-and-mortar space where there will be walk-in customers (restaurant, bakery, sandwich shop, etc.)
*The business can't be operating yet, though the entrepreneur must be aiming to open this year.
If you fit those criteria, assemble the information on your timeline, budget, menu and team. Write up a line or two about what's at stake for you in this endeavor (why you are doing it and what risks, financial as well as personal, you are taking). The network is "highly interested in the human-interest angle of your story."
Email your assembled information to foodtvshow@gmail.com.
Get a little info on the competition at the show's Facebook page, or look 'em up on Twitter, @RockShrimpProd.
Monday, February 6, 2012
Conversation Bites John Stamos, Super Bowl Ad Outrage and The Great Greek Yogurt Debate
Posted by Elizabeth Jones on Mon, Feb 6, 2012 at 4:14 PM
Innocently browsing for Greek yogurt coupons while also eating Oikos yogurt — delicious in spite of the use of papyrus in their logo — I happened upon their Facebook page, which has erupted in scandal.
Oikos (parent company is Dannon) ran a Super Bowl ad yesterday featuring John Stamos, in which a coy, flirty couple feed each other yogurt at the kitchen table. But wait! Stamos doesn't really want to share — he wants all the 'gurt to himself. Girl gets mad, and BAM! — she head-butts him. People now are outraged for two reasons: First, because the commercial uses a song eerily like the John Butler Trio's "Zebra"; and second, because the commercial "promotes violence." I remember viewing the commercial during the game, but only because it sparked exclamations like, "JOHN STAMOS LOOKS THE SAME AS HE LOOKED ON FULL HOUSE — HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE?"
Conversation Bites People on Radio Praise Sylvan Park Restaurant, Make Dumb Generalizations About the South
Posted by Steve Haruch on Mon, Feb 6, 2012 at 3:06 PM
- Photo: Eric England
- "What are these truck-like things with food in them? We're SO CONFUSED."
Uh ... OK. So, "the South" — defined this broadly — has a hot lunch, unlike every other part of the country, where no one eats a hot lunch or sits down for lunch. Got it. Someone alert Olive Garden! Seriously, this is such a dumb thing to say, I don't think it needs further commentary. But Stern can't stop herself from getting all amateur anthropologist, and this is where it goes from plain old dumb to one moon colony shy of a picnic:
Southerners are not sandwich-grabbers, they're not eat-on-the-run people the way New Yorkers are, they're not food truck people. They sit down like civilized ladies and gentlemen, and they order a piece of ham, a piece of fried chicken, an oxtail — whatever the meat of the day is — and their three favorite sides, with a little cornbread and a little yeast roll and a glass of sweet tea.
Aw, eat a lunch of little foods with simple folk who are never in a hurry and haven't changed since 1970. I think what bugged me about this was that she could have said the second part without saying the first part. Yes, you can go to a meat-and-three for lunch in the South. But it's not the only lunch there is. You can also have a sandwich, or even have Thai ... from a food truck. We have food trucks! Fancy that!
Hear the segment for yourself below. Spoiler alert: They really like Sylvan Park Restaurant.
Events Chef Jeremy Barlow and Mixologist Chris Capaldi Shine at Patrón Secret Dinner
Posted by Chris Chamberlain on Mon, Feb 6, 2012 at 8:09 AM
With less than a week between being notified that the dinner was coming to town and finding out the exact details, attendees were bubbling with anticipation as they entered the site of the event. In fact, just getting there was a challenge as downtown was literally a circus with the Nashville Symphony and Ringling Brothers both attracting crowds to the parking lot where dining society members had been summoned by a cryptic email. Plus it was raining cats and dogs.
As the crowd shook off the wet, we were entertained by a winsome country singer named Charlie West strumming away in the corner of the lobby while Patrón patrons checked in. Eventually we were given Patrón bottle tags with the number 21 on them, which was our key to the empty 21st floor of the Pinnacle building which had been transformed into a sultry dining room and vast makeshift kitchen for Barlow's crew. He jokingly described it to me as "The anti-tayst. I don't know what to do with this much space in the kitchen." Rollerskates would have been helpful.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Bites Post-Disaster Menu Forensics
Posted by Nicki Wood on Sun, Feb 5, 2012 at 5:40 AM
Take a quick look at this menu and decide what you want for lunch. Not gonna happen fast, right?
Our table of five huddled for several minutes just to assimilate what was being offered, and how it should be ordered. Like cavemen discovering tools, we'd share when we figured out some portion of it. "Oh look, you get chips with that." And, "I think you can get soup with that, but you don't have to."
It starts well enough, with standard delicious photography at the top. Then below on the left, a diagram to "Build Your Own Combo." Then below that, "Start Here."
"Start here" implies a journey. We've already been to the art museum and the chart department; where else could be possibly need to go before ordering?
We're at soups and salads, and here's a big sign that says "Get a Drink." I was ready to order, but here's a whole new "Finish the job" column. Figuring out what's in there, and how it compares to lunchy selections already encountered requires reading back through the previous sections.
Finally, before the end of the order journey, there's a bright yellow bar at the bottom for "Bottomless Express Lunch." And then there are choices within that.
Menu disaster forensics: It's hard to know what happened here, but here's an imagined scenario.
Friday, February 3, 2012
Open Thread Mindless Entertainment at Weekly Open Thread
Posted by Nicki Wood on Fri, Feb 3, 2012 at 9:21 AM
This week we forgo the backward glance and the view ahead to look at YouTube videos. Twinkie cannons naturally top of the list.
The scientific precision of the device in the first video (above) is admirable, and I have high hopes these guys will be part of a bright future for engineering in this country.
Here's a small-town tradition to warm your heart. The computer-generated voice, like the "Extra Normal" cartoons, is just icing on the cake of endearing weirdness. I especially like the halting warning, which phonetically goes something like this: 'Eff few ... have ... any ... safe-tee e-quip-ment, nowwould ... be.a.good time.to.be weareen ... git."
And for combustion PLUS Twinkies, here's a Twinkie in the microwave, part of the "Is It a Good Idea to Microwave ..." series.
Speaking of mindless entertainment, is there some type of sporting event going on this weekend? And will you be watching? Bring your ingenious ideas and entertaining food stories to the weekly open thread.
